The present invention relates to a vehicular protective accessory and more particularly to a brush guard attachment equipped with a toting rack.
Numerous luggage or tote racks for attachment to a vehicular front end or rear end have been proposed. Pivotally mounted racks equipped with chains to maintain the rack in a horizontally disposed toting position have been proposed. The chain also serves to retain the rack in an upright position when not in use. A toting platform embodying these chain retaining characteristics and adapted for mounting onto a snowplow frame is disclosed by U.S. Pat. No. 5,467,910 to Ritter et al. A grill and brush guard fitted with a utility rack pivotally mounted to a vehicular front end with rack stops which raises or lowers as an entire brush guard or tote rack unit is disclosed by U.S. Pat. No. 4,099,760 to Moseotte et al. A carrier attachment with a pivotally mounted platform for attachment to a vehicular rear end is disclosed in U.S. Pat. No. 5,092,503 to Cocks. Similarly, luggage carriers are disclosed in British patent specification 266,898; French Patent No, 557,139; and Belgium Patent No. 565,198. Another vehicular carrier apparatus for fixedly mounting to a vehicular front end is disclosed by U.S. Pat. No. 4,989,765 to Huehner.
Unfortunately, none of the proposed for vehicular carrier attachments or brush protectors provide adequate vehicular protection against brush damage when used to tote objects. The proposed attachments either serve as a tote rack when placed in a toting position and/or a brush protector when placed in the untoting or upright position. Insufficient protection to the vehicular front end arises when the rack is placed in a toting position which in turn can result in substantial brush damage to the vehicle.
The present invention provides a vehicular front-end toting attachment which serves as a vehicle brush guard even when positioned at a toting position. This attachment effectively protects a vehicular front end against brush and other impacting objects while transporting materials such as game kill in wooded areas. The attachment includes a pair of laterally disposed vertical support members; a protective brush rail transversely secured to the support members so as to afford guarding protection to vehicular front end against impacting objects; and a centrally disposed tote rack pivotally mounted between the support members.
The lower portion of the vertical support members may be appropriately contoured with an inner surface mating to an external vehicular bumper surface and particularly contoured for mating onto a top bumper rail surface. Projecting inwardly from a bottom region of each of the vertical support members is a detachable mounting means for mounting the vertical support members to a vehicular frame. The detachable mounting means firmly anchors the support members to the vehicle while also serving to maintain the support members and brush guard rail in a protective position.
The tote rack is centrally disposed within the attachment leaving the outwardly disposed regions protected by a protective brush guard rail. The rack is pivotally mounted along a bottom margin of the support members. The support members are equipped with a rack stop for maintaining the tote rack in the toting position and restraining means such as pins for restraining the tote rack in an upright position when the tote rack is not utilized for toting. When positioned in the upright position the tote rack offers additional protection to the vehicular front end against brush damage.
The brush rail may be of a U-shaped or channeled configuration designed to circumvent a vehicular front end and front fender side panels. The protective top brush rail is supportively anchored and connected to the support members. The brush rail protectively extends in a circuitous pattern about the front end of the vehicular front end so as to protect the front end from brush damage, including the front fender panels, grill and headlights. The brush rail includes a rearwardly positioned top brush rail section and a forwardly bottom brush rail section welded together, both of which bridge between the support members and proliferate along the face of the vehicular front end and peripherally wrap around the cornered edges of the front fenders. When it is desired to utilize the tote rack, a retaining pin may be removed so as to allow the vertically retained tote rack to pivotally drop to a toting position.
The bottom brush rail section compliments the protective features of the top rail section. The bottom rail section flushly rests against the top bumper rail and is interconnectively anchored to the vertical support members in a lateral and horizontally disposed relationship to the top brush rail. The bottom and top brush rails contribute structural support to the vertical support members which in turn provide the vehicular mount for the accessory. A bisecting rail guard extending outwardly from the support members and generally following the planar curvature of the top rail and bottom rail to its intersect with the brush rail provides added protection against brush damage.